Origin of Bangla Second Part Ghoti The Highlander E-Book

Dibyendu Chakraborty

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

Naru, a Bengali by birth, was shown by destiny that the process of peopling India had happened along the Prehistoric Elevated Highway Systems of India. Adivasis came first, and then a different group followed them to get settled in the highlands. In Bengal, the members of that new group later became known as ‘Ghoti’. 

Leseprobe

Dibyendu Chakraborty

Origin of Bangla Second Part Ghoti The Highlander

ॐ श्री विष्णवे नम: (OM SHRI VISHNAVE NAMAH) Late Doctor Dinesh Chandra Chakraborty, My Grandfather and Author of the Series of Books, ‘A Treatise on Kala-Azar’ Published from Calcutta during 1920-22 BookRix GmbH & Co. KG81371 Munich

Prelude

Some trading partners were obviously needed to start a trade. Even if the Tibetans came up-to Kalimpong and adjoining areas, then they could also not engage in trade, had they come there before human settlements started on the opposite side.

Had the Tibetans (if they originated and started exploring first) came to the north of the present-day Bengal at the southern margin of the Himalayas and decided that the land lying in front of them was qualified to be a ‘La’ then also they could not name that ‘La’ as ‘Bongola’ (Origin of Bangla-First Part) because ‘Bongo’ was yet to be coined. After the peopling of that geography in the foothills of present-day Bangla, when ‘Bongo’ came into existence, then only ‘Bongola’ could become a reality. On the other hand, if ‘Bongo’ was already in existence and the Tibetans visited that land afterwards, then the name ‘Bongola’ was coined without any delay. In either of the cases, the journey of Bangla started. All the people of the Indian part of Bengal call it Bangla in their mother tongue. The desire to unravel the process of formation of a distinct linguistic human group that later would create a political boundary provided fuel to Naru’s lamp of quest.

Chapter 1 - Journeys unravelling the Prehistoric Elevated Highway System

An adventitious tryst with an Adivasi (earliest inhabitants) heartland

At the end of the decade of the 1980s, Naru was suddenly dictated by destiny to visit the nondescript town of Chakradharpur in Bihar (present-day Jharkhand) on the Chota Nagpur Plateau. That plateau is considered to be one of the oldest continuously-inhabited areas on the earth. Situated very close to the borders of ‘Bongo’ or ‘Bangla’, that town has gained its importance from railway operations. It occupies an important place on the map of the Indian Railways. One of Naru’s close relatives was stationed there for quite some time then. The first few days of the sojourn were hectic due to the family event.  Naru could observe that the immediate surroundings of that place were similar to those of the industrial towns situated in the western part of his home district. Situated at a higher elevation, that place had flat terrain with relatively drier weather and devoid of vast green pastures, which are typical to a river basin.

Inside the railways-owned area, where the residential quarters were present (it was not like a rail colony in a regular sense), wide open flat places were available with large trees scattered here and there. The gentle breeze of the summer evenings, when enjoyed in those sparsely grass-covered open fields, called for a devout thanksgiving to the creator.

From the major streets, a few shadowy hills were visible, which seemed to be not very far away. Being a resident of the south of Bangla, Naru never saw a hill from close proximity. His home district is a vast, almost-flat land. In that just ended teen age, the provocation created by the sight was enough to embark on an adventurous tour to the direction of one of those hills one day.

With one of his elder cousin brothers, the adventure started one day in the mid-morning on a bicycle. It did not take long time to leave the town area behind. The landscape started to become undulated. Small patches of open areas were present within the natural forests intermittently. The general look and feel of the terrain went on becoming rougher as they proceeded on their journey. They crossed a bridge of a river, on the bank of which on a board it was written “Sanjoy Nad”, which means the River Sanjoy in English. In no sense could that water-flow stand for a river in Naru’s hometown. The most prominent river of Naru's home district has originated from the highlands of the Chotanagpur plateau and runs through Naru’s hometown. That river is at least a hundred times wider than the River Sanjoy at Chakradharpur. The channel of the River Sanjoy was very rocky; hardly any soil could be seen on its bed, and a real thin layer of the flowing water was there at the bottom of those rocks. It seemed that some giant tossed those massive boulders on that riverbed. The places on the banks were also scattered with such rocks. At many places, algae formations were there on the disconnected, stagnant water on the riverbed.

They gave a pause to their journey at that spot. The most interesting finding at that spot was a beehive hanging from an overhead water reservoir, on the upper side of the river. Naru had many close encounters with beehives all through his childhood, and he had a notion that some of those that he had seen were significantly large. Within the university campus, where Naru’s father had created a small garden, beehives used to be formed on the bigger trees, mainly on the drumstick trees. It was quite an experience to break those hives and extract honey from those at the appropriate stage. But those hives were no match to the one that was hanging from that water reservoir on the bank of the River Sanjay. The hive was at least five feet wide and that much tall. Those bees were also considerably larger than the ones seen in the south Bengal region. It would be another one and half decades that Naru would come to know about an invasion of the larger and more aggressive bee species of African origin that has happened all over the world in the not-so-distant past.

The world around had started becoming desolate. For many minutes, they did not see any person around. Somewhere near that place, the existence of the modern-day road ended. A road was there which bore the sign of maintenance, but that was an uncovered road. Beyond that river, the path had a gentle upward slope, which was getting steeper apace. They came nearer to one of those hills, which attracted them to that place. At some places, that path had branched out. A few of those branched-out paths were of equal width that of the main road, and that had made it hard to decide which one was the continuation of the main path. As no one was there to enquire about anything, they followed their hearts and proceeded forward. The path reached higher elevation, wherefrom the overview of the low-lying areas became available. For them, that bird's eye view was a reward enough to put in the effort to scale the uphill path by two persons on a single bicycle. The road gradually became one-sided, meaning on one side, i.e., on the left hand side, the hill was creating a wall and on the right side the low-lying areas down below started to be seen.

Another equally rewarding change did happen in the surroundings; the colour of the soil of the path got transformed. Till date, it has remained one-of-a-lifetime experience for Naru. The small gravels strewn on the path there were very colourful, having a range of colour from light maroon to dense purple, and of innumerable shades in between. Gravels with a few shades of light yellow punctuated those gravels occasionally. The base colour of the soil was also changed to light red, the colour of the lateritic soil. Naru had never seen such type of soil in his hometown area. For a cyclist, it remains imperative to keep a vigilant eye on the road, and that becomes more crucial on the hill roads. Both the sides of the path started to turn greener with the presence of slender, straight trees, along with the random presence of small bushes. Whenever Naru was shifting his eyes off the path to any other object, sudden flashes of maroon, purple, red and yellow colour were passing through his vision, which he was unable to focus on. It would be another three decades, when he would see a few animated characters in a movie, playing with static electricity, in pure joy. He would be able to relate easily to the joy of those characters in that movie.

When they climbed about two hundred feet above the surrounding flat lands, that time the path took a sharp bend on the left and moved inside the hill. The expanded view of the lower terrain was obstructed by a higher hill that appeared on the right side. On the left-hand side, the path proceeded to a flat patch of land that was covered with a forest of straight trees.

Human settlement was there on the left side, and that created a little uneasy feeling in Naru. But the sight of that place was impressive. Within the vegetation of the straight trees, the visible area where a few scattered huts made of mud walls and thatched roof were there, was picturesque. Huts with neatly swabbed, smooth mud walls of very light brown colour, having swabbed small roundish open yards in front of them, within the setting of the green forest, were like pictures from the books which were just pasted on the natural settings. The lowest two-foot height of the walls of those huts were coloured in dark brown. Neatly painted decorative designs in white adorned those walls. The thatch covers were trimmed in a way that was better than the moustaches of a showman. Naru had earlier visited a few Adivasi villages in Bengal. Those villages were also cleaner than non-Adivasi villages, but the neatness of the houses on that hill, near Chakradharpur, was of another dimension.

A small number of such houses could be spotted within a stretch of a few hundred feet, which Naru's vision could capture within the settings of the forest. For Naru, that setting was that of a fairyland. Only a couple of mortal beings came into the sight. A huge ‘cylinder tube well’ was there near the path in the open space, a little away from the huts. That type of a tube well is capable of drawing water from a considerable depth. Suddenly, Naru and his brother felt that they were searching for water for a long time. The taste of the water was wonderful; a taste of sweetness was mixed with the smell of minerals. It was at the end of the session of water drinking when the elder brother drew Naru's notice towards the right hand direction, over the forest. The path became narrower and took the shape of a trail rather than a path, and went towards that direction. A little away, beside that trail, a whole room was there, built on the top of a tree. The setting of that place was primitive but astonishingly and enviably organised.

That was the time, when the next wave of the development of the automobile industry was starting in India, at a gap of nearly four decades, after the Second World War and the first wave of car production. Both cars and motorbikes for the commoners of the new age were being rolled out in the metropolitan areas. It would take another couple of decades for that wave to reach the remote areas of the Chota Nagpur Plateau. Bullock carts, the MUVs of rural India, were of no use in the hilly terrains. If any necessity arose to visit the nearest modern habitations, then a person would have to trek or cycle for hours, and if the situation called for it, then by carrying some heavy load too. Whatever might be the physical constitution of a person, such journeys cannot be undertaken for a long time. What could have been the way out? The inhabitants of those places learnt through the ages to contain their lives within the geographical limits of their habitats with the help of the endowments provided by Mother Nature.

Suddenly, Naru heard a voice coming from the left side. An elderly woman was calling them. That signal was enough for them to be alerted. From experience, Naru knew that chitchat with those people could take any turn at any moment. Mismatch of wavelengths. Turning the bicycle, they promptly commenced their return journey.

The return journey was less laboursome as they went downhill. While going downhill, the journey that took around four hours in the uphill direction, ended in one hour. A cyclist has to remain extra cautious while going downhill, and for that reason, Naru kept his eyes glued to the path. He continued to see those colourful but illusionary flashes even a long time after reaching the residence. 

If the primary needs of life are taken care of, and the feeling of deprivation is not forcefully injected into the minds of people, then that place could be an ideal place for a small community to spend a quiet lifetime. Presumably, that observation remained true for a remarkably extended period for those people on that hill.

First visit to Bombay